English

Sylvester's problem for beta-type distributions

Probability 2025-06-03 v2 Metric Geometry

Abstract

Consider d+2d+2 i.i.d. random points X1,,Xd+2X_1,\ldots, X_{d+2} in Rd\mathbb R^d. In this note, we compute the probability that their convex hull is a simplex focusing on three specific distributional settings: (i) the distribution of X1X_1 is multivariate standard normal; (ii) the density of X1X_1 is proportional to (1x2)β(1-\|x\|^2)^{\beta} on the unit ball (the beta distribution); (iii) the density of X1X_1 is proportional to (1+x2)β(1+\|x\|^2)^{-\beta} (the beta prime distribution). In the Gaussian case, we show that this probability equals twice the sum of the solid angles of a regular (d+1)(d+1)-dimensional simplex.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.2501.00671,
  title  = {Sylvester's problem for beta-type distributions},
  author = {Anna Gusakova and Zakhar Kabluchko},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2501.00671},
  year   = {2025}
}

Comments

12 pages

R2 v1 2026-06-28T20:53:42.121Z